An idiot alone

[@Wildlife_Mgr]

Just been to look round that block of woodland I told you about Graham. It's not for me... Don't get me wrong, the woods themselves (77 acres) are real nice but it's been split in to too many individual blocks making it unworkable.

[the village idiot]

Just been to look round that block of woodland I told you about Graham. It's not for me... Don't get me wrong, the woods themselves (77 acres) are real nice but it's been split in to too many individual blocks making it unworkable.

 

Yes, that's what they do unfortunately. Good in some ways I suppose but bad in others. At least you got a nice walk out of it. I'll send you a PM Mark about how I went about approaching woodland/landowners.

 

Most importantly, keep looking. You will find one:thumbup:

[@Wildlife_Mgr]

No worries mate. I'll look forward to it

[scraggs]

Have been out that way today, am I right in thinking it's the wood on the left just after you turn for Hintleshan on the sharp bend in Raydon, can't tell from the map.

[njmusk]

Not as far as I know. I haven't heard any bikes buzzing about. I do get mustangs flying over and some lunatic does acrobatics over the wood in another machine.

Farmer_ben is probably your man for motorbike trials, he may know.

 

If i remember rightly raydon pits was on the hadleigh side of raydon, on the left before coming into raydon, whereas your wood is placed over the far side of raydon. I used to belong to the essex and suffolk border motorcyle club. We used to run trials between holton st mary, raydon and hadleigh a couple of times a year.

 

You could get some of them pigeon scarring rockets and let em off when them pesky planes fly over, yes i am guilty of doing that in the past over a spitfire, that shakes em up,

[njmusk]

No worries mate. I'll look forward to it

 

The missus wants us to buy a wood so that i can build a log cabin for our retirement.

[the village idiot]

Have been out that way today, am I right in thinking it's the wood on the left just after you turn for Hintleshan on the sharp bend in Raydon, can't tell from the map.

 

Hi Keith, yes, its a few hundred yards down that road on the left. All access roads are padlocked and there is very little of the wood that is public access, but if you wanted a pootle around I'd be happy to show you. I need to make sure the deer stalkers aren't in!

[scraggs]

Hi Keith, yes, its a few hundred yards down that road on the left. All access roads are padlocked and there is very little of the wood that is public access, but if you wanted a pootle around I'd be happy to show you. I need to make sure the deer stalkers aren't in!

 

I would very much like that some time.

When I walked the one we tried to buy locally a few times it was somewhere you could just get away from it all, the wildlife and peace was fantastic, was like another world.

It's a very nice opportunity for someone.

[the village idiot]

 

Just one of the many reasons why the 25 hectares North of the old railway line at Raydon Wood is so special. In the spring the floor is carpeted with Wood Anemone's. The sight and smell is wonderful.

 

As I said earlier, this portion of Raydon Great Wood escaped the attentions of the warring Amricans and the ill-advised authors. It is a fairly extensive block of hazel and Ash coppice under Oak standards. After hundreds of years coppicing ceased around 70 years ago. The result is an amazing, biodiverse rarity in decline, but also a big untapped resource.

 

Coppicing started in this area this winter. The plan is to cut 1 hectare every year for 25 years and then starting again at the beginning. Having said that, just for this winter I am doing three compartments. They all have ponds in them and I had to clear enough water to make it cost effective to bring a big machine in to do the desilting.

 

Cutting in this area is hugely rewarding as you make such an amazing visual impact on the wood, safe in the knowledge that as long as the deer can be controlled you are doing the resident wildlife a huge favour by letting in all that light, stimulating the new growth.

 

Doing three compartments on one's own would be a herculean ask at the best of times, let alone when there are big ponds to swallow up all my wayward felling. For this reason I enlisted the help of the dashingly handsome Arbtalk regular Logan with his marvelous machines to do one of the coupes for me.

 

 

The picture doesn't really do justice to the fantastic job that he did earlier this month. And doesn't show the big piles of logs and timber he generated. See if you can spot him lurking in the undergrowth.

 

Below is a picture of yours truly surveying the scene on the last day of operations

 

 

The coppicing in these areas produces lots of material with many different potential uses. In the next edition of The Idiot Chronicles I'll attempt to give you some idea of the type of material that arises and what I do with it in my attempts to make the woods profitable.

 

All the best, TVI

[Kveldssanger]

Wonderful opportunity, and best of luck with the management.

 

How rare it is to come across a Rob Darken photo on Arbtalk.